Semiconductor devices are typically manufactured from ingots of crystalline semiconductor materials that have been sliced into wafers having a predetermined thickness. These wafers are then cut into dies having predetermined dimensions, such as 0.5 cm. by 0.5 cm. The dies are then etched and oxidized using various chemicals and masks, such that predetermined circuits are created on the dies. Such processes are well known in the art.
During the manufacture of such devices, defects or flaws may be formed or inadvertently created on one or more dies before or after they have been cut from the wafer. Such defects or flaws will typically cause the device to misoperate. It is desirable to detect such defective or flawed dies before the dies are shipped to a customer. Although systems and methods have been implemented that may be used to detect defective or flawed dies, such systems and methods require an operator to set up each wafer, such as by selecting dies that are not defective that are then used to create a model. The model may then be compared with other dies of the wafer. The systems and methods then perform the comparison between the model die and each die of the silicon wafer, thus reducing the time required to check each die of the silicon wafer as compared with manual inspection of each die.
While such inspection systems have decreased the time and operator involvement that are required to inspect each die of a silicon wafer, operator setup of the inspection system now occupies a significant portion of the time required to inspect the dies. Accordingly, there has been a need for a system and method for detecting defective or flawed dies that does not require an operator to manually select model dies for each new wafer.